It is a good thing, a great thing, the U.S. hostages/prisoners are being released. However, to find out that President Obama and John Kerry allowed the hostages to be used as leverage to block sanctions – is a little disappointing.

The day before new sanctions were due to be implemented, Iran told the U.S. the fate of the prisoners was dependent on no new sanctions. Kerry agreed.

As with all other strategic decisions from this administration our adversaries only need to consider the political benefits of President Obama in their counter-strategy. Knowing the White House only makes deals based on political best interests, gives our adversaries a significant structural advantage in how they approach negotiations.

(Via Reuters) The day before the Obama administration was due to slap new sanctions on Iran late last month, Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif warned U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry the move could derail a prisoner deal the two sides had been negotiating in secret for months.

Kerry and other top aides to President Barack Obama, who was vacationing in Hawaii, convened a series of conference calls and concluded they could not risk losing the chance to free Americans held by Tehran.

At the last minute, the Obama administration officials decided to delay a package of limited and targeted sanctions intended to penalize Iran for recent test-firings of a ballistic missile capable of delivering a nuclear warhead.

This account of previously unreported internal deliberations was provided by two people with knowledge of the matter.

A third official said Obama had approved the decision to delay the sanctions.

Those unilateral U.S. sanctions are expected to be imposed quickly now after Iran freed five Americans, including Washington Post journalist Jason Rezaian, on Saturday. Eight Iranians accused in the United States of sanctions violations were having charges dropped or sentences commuted on Saturday under the complex prisoner deal, according to court filings and sources familiar with the cases.

The moves came as broader U.S. and international sanctions were set to be lifted after verification that it had met commitments to curb its nuclear program.

But Kerry’s decision not to call Iran’s bluff in December shows how months of clandestine negotiations to free Rezaian and other Americans became deeply intertwined with the final push to implement the nuclear deal, despite the official U.S. line that those efforts were separate.

A U.S. official said on Saturday there was no connection between the nuclear deal and the release of the Americans.

The prisoner swap could also come under scrutiny from critics who have questioned the Obama administration’s resolve in dealing with Iran and ability to follow through on its pledge to keep a hard line on sanctions outside those imposed on its nuclear program.

The episode was one of several diplomatic and military near misses between Iran and the United States in recent weeks, including a quickly defused crisis when 10 U.S. sailors were detained after entering Iranian waters. (read more)

They look like fools. Why didn’t they get them back BEFORE negotiating anything?
Why so many years to get those hostages back? Why didn’t they even care or keep them front and center in the news?
And why do they suddenly care now? Trump.

Trump would have made release of the hotages a precondition to beginning talks on lifting sanctions and the money that goes with that. But the two fools, kerry and obozo, let the Iranians bilk them. Amazing but not surprising.

Excuse my language but I am about getting pissed off at the threats against Donald’s life that no one is looking into or doing a damn thing about. I was just reading in the WSJ about Donald now having 33% of the likely Republican voters polled. Cruz 20%, and Rubio about 15% as I recall. Most of the comments were nasty anti Trump of course. There were a FEW nice ones. But one man, I’ll take it a rino/crat, suggested that we release ElChapo so he can kill Trump so no one has to listen to him anymore. That makes 6 death threats I have read so far and it’s getting old. What’s even more maddening is that I’ve been told nothing can be done about it. I threatened to turn a blm thug in to the FBI and he laughed at me. ” You white s.o.b., you think Loretta Lynch will do any thing to me? I have my 1st amendment right to say what the ( expletive deleted ) I wanna say”. No wonder I’ve become a racist in the past 5 months. gOD BLEES. Have a peaceful weekend.

This $150 billion – this is kinda fishy, as it’s a return of Their assets that were frozen.

So who has been “holding” it all this time? Did “they” (I’m guessing a bank, but I really don’t know) invest it, draw interest, back derivitaves – what the heck happens to “frozen assets” from another country.

I can’t figure out how to give likes on here but I would say yes Trump. They don’t want to deal with him. The others are worthless. For example Cruz co-authored, co-sponsored Corker’s Iran Bill and voted to give Obama Executive Action. Trump 2016

People who view this latest news as a failure on the part of the Obama administration don’t realize that the return of these hostages is the excuse that Obama used to justify what he wanted to do in the first place: Build a stronger IRAN — in a “Post American” world.

It was a failure for America, but a huge success for Obama. The rest is just political “spin”

Letjustice –
There is a bigger picture going on here as well that people are missing. Obama is beholden to Wall Street and his various donors who funded his election operations. With all the sanctions lifted and Iran now free to pump as much oil as they can …

There are oil company executives, hedge fund managers and Wall Street bankers already flying over to Tehran. This is a HUGE moment for them, delivered courtesy of their errand boy Barack Obama. He and his wife will become obscenely rich after January 2017 in ways the Clintons only dreamed of.

Obama has now delivered to his masters, on a silver platter, the two great heretofore unavailable investment playgrounds; Tehran & Cuba.

It was never really about a “nuke deal”. It was about investment. They’re going to have nukes regardless of the deal.

No you really don’t want to see Israel complicate things. I think what we might like to see and the pretty predictable consequences of <0’s shenanigans with Iran is that the Saudis get seriously adverse to Iran and vice versa, fueling an even more “all out” war between shia and sunni mooseslimes. Of course, they could grow a brain cell, unify and then all the Jews would be in the sea and we’d really be in trouble, too. Fortunately, that’s about as likely as <0bum0, Cruz, Rubio, or Bush (any of the men, anyway) telling the truth.

San bernadino, pakistanis
9/11 , saudi arabian
Guantanamo , out of the 880 or so prisoners… ONE, is Iranian

pakistan : killed more American then iran in the past 30 years. pakistan does have nuclear weapon and nucelar lunch capabilities… And protected bin laden.
Any American care that we give this country 4 billion a year in support ?

pakistan : men can have multiple wives , and by law has young as 16 year hold.
pakistan just passed a law to re-affirm any men can own 16 year old wives.
A 50 year old men can buy a 16 year old child and by sharia law can beat her untill she become sexually submissive. If we still refuse she can be stoned.
BY LAW.

Saudi arabia : christian are persecuted and brining bibles is punish by execution. No cross can be seen in public, women cant driver, etc.. etc.. saudi arabia judicial law is also SHARIA. they do more beheading then ISIS, and also crusifiction. some vrimes including , blogging against the royal familly.

Where is the outrage about those two country we deal with, and give money to.
No sanctions…

conservativeveinny – you think correctly. There has been a number of pro-Iranian-blame the Jews comments here in recent weeks. They all seem to be from the same person, using different usernames. This time he calls himself mr right, but the language and sentence structure is consistent with his other posts. More telling is that he always strives to make the same point – Iran is a moderate Christian loving modern country, the USA only supports countries that fuel islamic terror, the world would be a better place if the “palastinians” had their own land, land which is now occupied by the dirty, filthy Jews who are, naturally, the cause of all the worlds problems.

I hope mr. right has his 1st class tickets already. I hope (doubt) all the people that think he IS mr. right, will take his advise and book flights as soon as possible.
I can’t wait until President Trump Forces them on trains, planes and boats, to where ever their alegiance is.
TRUMP 2016!!
p.s. I hope mr. right gets seats next to obomao, valjay, and kerry. Don’t care if it’s 1st class.

These Islamists just put the veil on Obama and Kerry and sold them to some friends… Nice work guys. A great example of getting along to make a deal work. This is the GOP all over again. Remember all the participants names as Iran goes crazy with money and weapons… Have a nice day…

When there’s a fuslim calling the shots as his lackeys are talking to other fuslims, you know darn well the first fuslim is going to do everything possible to help the other fuslims screw over his lackeys.

When we are dealing with the Iranians, we must proceed from a position of strength. Being nice doesn’t work with them, they consider us deciteful. Nor will warmongering work, as the neoconservatives like Marco Rubio want.

Without Russia and China, the Iranians have no diplomatic cover. Trump, and only Trump, will be able to beat them in a negotiation. We can trade recognition of Crimea in exchange for Russia dropping Iran.

IMO..These Iran “issues” will continue non-stop so long as Trump continues to grow support and dominate on the road to victory. Anything and everything to maintain a smokescreen and distract the electorate as much as possible.

Thinking about looking at second hand stores and antique malls for a school desk. Some of you recall the kind that, if you get under them with your hands on top of your head, you survive a nuclear missle?

Too well. I knew at the age of 10 (because I was already reading Ray Bradbury and my dad was keen on science) that it was stupid to think a desk would help. And we lived in San Diego, which we were sure would be a prime target.

Grew up a stone’s throw from Barksdale SAC. Found out in 5th Grade, as I recall, that we would have @15 mins from the time ICBMs were sighted by NORAD crossing the North Pole. Nobody bothered to do those stupid “turtle” drills.

The detainment of Navy personnel recently was actually part of the hostage exchange. If you look closely at the videos released by Iran you will see at least three of the Russian paratroopers being held in Ukraine. http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/multimedia/archive/00757/Kiev_and_Moscow_spa_757307a.jpg The guy in the upper right of the linked photos is real easy to identify. You will have to look at other photos of the Russian prisoners to identify others.

Tried to post the link on facebook-got to the page alright and read it then tried posting and got this 2x. The content you requested cannot be displayed right now. It may be temporarily unavailable, the link you clicked on may have expired, or you may not have permission to view this page. Funny that alrighty then.

Today the four Americans who have been unjustly held in in Iran are finally returning home and we welcome them with open arms. They and their families have been through unspeakable pain and suffering and their freedom brings relief to not only them, but the entire country.

“But in our elation over their safe return we must be careful not to forget the dangerous circumstances of their release. President Obama has appeased Iran’s terror-sponsoring ayatollahs, this time with a ‘prisoner’ swap to secure the overdue release of four innocent American hostages in return for which Iran gets seven lawfully convicted terrorists and criminals, fourteen terrorism prosecutions halted, $100 billion in sanctions relief, and an industrial-scale nuclear program-and Iran gets to keep Americans Siamak Namazi and Robert Levinson to extract future concessions. While we exult in the return of American hostages, one must also wonder how many more Americans will be taken hostage in the future as a result of President Obama’s shameful decision to negotiate with these terrorists.

History will view these acts as treason…clemency, pre-trial pardon, commutation, dismissal of fugitive warrants…involving 14 individuals. All for what…an agreement that has not even been signed?
How do the families of soldiers killed in Iraq by Iranian sponsored shia militias feel?

But we know what this is all about…

All quotes:

Boeing, GE say get U.S. license to sell spare parts to Iran …

Iran says it has concluded three contracts with US aviation giant Boeing after it signed the Geneva nuclear agreement with the P5+1 group of countries

Iran plans to buy Airbus and Boeing passenger planes

At least 13 major international companies have said in recent weeks that they aim to reenter the Iranian marketplace over the next several months. The companies have received Pentagon contracts totaling well over $107 billion, according to a Washington Free Beacon

Many of the companies, which include carmaker Renault and oil giants such as BP, have already sent high-level trade delegations to Tehran to meet with Iranian officials about striking new business deals

Obama will anything to help or enemies and harm USA….how can that traitor still be in office?

An interesting comparison….Obama wants to provide sanctions relief in the amount of $150 Billion to Iran….since 1946 US has provided $126 Billion to Israel.

That’s a WHOLE lot of money to give to a state which OPENLY sponsors terrorism worldwide and whose ‘religious’ leaders openly state that they wish to destroy the USA; that it is in fact their destiny to prepare the way for the second coming of “The Hidden Imam”….

My guess is an EMP Electromagnetic Pulse will be used against the USA to destroy our electrical infrastructure within 6 years, and a missile will be used to deliver it/them. The use of such a device will cause the breakdown of civilized society and 90% of US citizens will perish within a year.